Cheap Easy & Quick Scarf

It is freezing cold here today in Northern Saskatchewan and with the wind a howling makes it even worse.  Around -42 with the wind chill!! Brrrrr!!  Great day to stay inside.  I made banana bread today, the same banana bread that I have made for the last 20 years or more.  But today I made some substitutions, greek yogurt instead of sour cream and apple sauce instead of oil.  Turned out beautifully delicious :)  AND, I mixed it in my handy dandy new KitchenAid Mixmaster that I got for Christmas.  How have I lived all my life without a Mixmaster?  It made it so much easier.

But also made a super cute, easy & cheap scarf today.

I love wearing scarves, so easy to accessorize a sweater or t-shirt.  For this baby, I got a used t-shirt at the thrift store.  I just want a plain black scarf.  The t-shirt I bought for $0.99 had some logo stuff on it but it didn't matter.  Cut the t-shirt across horizontally anywhere below the arm pits so you end up with a squareish/regtanularish shape in a continuous loop.  The more of the t-shirt you leave on, the more of the solid part of the scarf you will have.  Now just cut the t-shirt into strips from the hem of the shirt up - as long as you want your fringe to be.  I cut through both sides at the same time.  Once its all cut, you just pull each piece of fringe down, it will curl onto itself. And your done!!  Was thinking you could even put some beads onto the fringe part if you really wanted to. 

So there it is, cheap (99 cents), easy, (no sewing required), and quick (about 10 minutes).

Dried mixes

I like to think of myself as somewhat healthy.  I have recently quit smoking.  Seemed kind of hypocritical to run and eat healthy yet still smoke lol.  I also try to eat as 'clean' as possible, for health reasons and now for practical reasons.  It's an hour drive to the nearest fast food chain that starts with Mc and ends with donalds.  Eating clean means to eat things as close to their natural state as possible.  Obviously fruits and veggies are a big part of that, as well as eating stuff with as few additives as possible. A lot of what we buy has fewer than 5 ingredients and as few things as we can't pronounce as possible - i.e. organic peanut butter that contains peanuts... and only peanuts.  However, I still like convenience.  Just because I have all day doesn't mean I want to spend it churning my own butter.  To that extent, today I made these.

Homemade dried mixes for taco's, ranch dressing or dip and onion soup mix. All of these I use as they were intended, but I also use them a lot in cooking other things.  So now I have them on hand, without all the crappy chemicals added to the packaged products and at a fraction of the cost.  Here's how to make yours ( from the blog Self-Reliance by Jamie)

TACO SEASONING

1/2 cup chili powder

1/4 cup onion powder

1/8 cup ground cumin

1 Tbsp garlic powder

1 Tbsp paprika

1 Tbsp sea salt

Put all the ingredients in a jar and shake

DRY ONION SOUP MIX

2/3 cup dried minced onion

3 tsp parsley flakes

2 tsp onion powder 

2 tsp tumeric

1 tsp celery salt

1 tsp sea salt

1 tsp sugar

1/2 tsp ground pepper

Put all ingredients in a jar and shake. Give the jar a good shake each time you use it

Use 4 Tbsp in a recipe in place of 1 packet of Onion Soup Mix

Store in cool dry place

Ranch Mix

5 Tbsp dried minced onions

7 tsp parsley flakes

4 tsp salt

1 tsp garlic powder

Put all ingredients in a jar and shake.

For dressing: Mix 2 Tbsp dry mix with 1 cup mayo and 1 cup buttermilk or sour cream

For dip: Mix 2 Tbsp dry mix with 2 cups sour cream (I use greek yogurt for a healthier dip)

 

I used small mason jars to store my mixes because I had them on hand.  (I didn't have enough of the ingredients for the ranch to make a full batch which is why is looks a little sparse.) However, I've gotten into the habit of saving jars.  Any jar.  I save the jars from jam (will try making my own this year!), salsa (ditto), spaghetti sauce, pickles, olive oil and anything else. Just be sure your jars are clean and dry.  Try not to use plastic containers like Ziploc or Rubbermaid as they emit chemicals that can seep into your mixes.

Enjoy and Bon Appetit :)

 

 

Well the problem of where to put hats and mitts where it is easily accessible has been solved.

You might remember this baby.  It's the ugly old brown dresser that I bought earlier in the week from a thrift store for $40.  Top drawer is removed and replaced with a shelf and basket to throw stuff into, remaining drawers painted and usable for hats and mitts!!! (among other things).  Pretty enough to leave out in our "Ode to the homeland" room - notice the red, white & blue paint splashed walls behind the dresser lol.

entry way project

So hubby left for work today which means its just me and the dog for the next two weeks.  What to do with myself?  Well I do have to return to 'the city' next weekend for my grandson "THE BUG"'s 3rd birthday party, but in the meantime I needed something to occupy my time.

We enter our home through the basement and have a large mudroom to enter by.  I had a closet built when we were finishing this longish narrowish room.  Its a great walk-in closet with one side to hold our coats and the other to hold my shoes - there are a lot of them.  I have a freestanding shelf thingy to hold everything else. This stand thingy is not nearly big enough, but it is big enough to be in the way.  I need an alternative.

That's where this ugly thing comes in.

 It's old,dirty, has some crayon art, and kind of smelly.  The picture doesn't show how beat up it is actually.

Anyway, this is my project.  Watch for the finished project!!

And here we go...

I have always lived in or around a major city. Now at 46, I have recently moved to the middle of nowhere with the closest town of 700 people 15 kms away. Definitely gone from city chick to country hick. So now, almost 4 months into it, unpacking done, decorating almost finished, and Christmas past I will be trying new things to occupy my time - and subsequently writing about them here. Hopefully I can share something's fun and useful that others can use in their life.  LET THE ADVENTURES BEGIN!